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Biggles in the Jungle/plot
Chapter 1: Biggles Meets an Old Friend Feeling bored at home, Biggles, Algy and Ginger take their amphibian, the Wanderer for a pleasure cruise in Central America. They land at Belize where Biggles meets an old friend, the acting governor Carruthers. Carruthers is worried. Deep in the jungle, someone who calls himself The Tiger or the King of the Jungle is stirring trouble among the Indians and harassing the chicle collectors so that the flow of chicle to the coast, a vital export commodity, had stopped. To add to this, Carruthers has orders to look for three missing Americans who had gone missing while searching for the fabled Carmichael treasure in the jungle. Biggles offers to help with both problems. Chapter 2: An Unexpected Encounter The next morning Biggles and co. fly into the interior. Ginger spots some pyramids and they put down on a stretch of water to explore. They find the body of an injured man on the river bank. It turns out to be a chicle collector, Dusky. Biggles is helping him into the aircraft when a tall bearded man, Cristoval Bogat. He wants Dusky handed over but Biggles refuses and they take off with Dusky. Chapter 3: Dusky Tells His Story and Ginger Learns a Lesson Dusky tells Biggles that he and his brothers were chicle collectors. They had been captured by the The Tiger. Dusky's brothers had been shot while he had been forced, like many other collectors, to work as slave labour, tapping rubber. He added that more recently, two men had come to see the Tiger and thereafter, the prisoners were switched to digging at some ruined city in the jungle. Biggles sends Algy down to Belize with a report for Carruthers. Meanwhile Ginger learns a lesson when he gets lost after a short walk and has to be rescued by Dusky. Chapter 4: A Visitor and a Mystery Algy returns with Carruthers and his assistant Marcel Chorro. Carruthers swears Biggles, Algy and Ginger in as special constables, giving them the authority to deal with the Tiger. Biggles flies Carruthers back to Belize. On his way back to base camp, he discovers that his aircraft has been sabotaged. Obviously the Tiger or Bogat has friends, and not just in the jungle. Chapter 5: The Enemy Strikes During the night, Dusky hears people approaching. Biggles evacuates the base camp and they all get on board the Wanderer. Bogat turns up with some troops. There is some shooting but Biggles takes off safely. Ginger spots a plateau with a ruined city and they land to explore. At the edge of the plateau, they find a staircase built on a ledge on the rockface. Dusky says he has seen the base of the staircase before--when he was working as one of the Tiger's slaves labourers. Biggles decides to go down the steps to explore while Algy and Dusky remain with the aircraft. Chapter 6: Down the Unknown Trail At the foot of the staircase, Biggles and Ginger discover a village which they conclude must be the Tiger's camp. They enter a big house and discover the Tiger's office where they find a note from Marcel Chorro warning the Tiger about Biggles. So Marcel was a spy! They want to leave to rejoin Algy but find their way to the door barred by a large snake! Chapter 7: In the Claws of the Tiger Biggles and Ginger are captured by the Tiger. He puts them into a cage partitioned into two halves. On the other side is the Tiger's panther, Juanita. Chapter 8: Algy Explores Algy decides that something must have gone wrong and so descends the staircase with Dusky to look for his his two friends. He finds them in the cage. But a crowd of the Tiger's men have spotted him and are moving towards the cage as well. So Algy climbs to the top of the cage and pulls a lever to release the panther. This causes the crowd to scatter. Biggles and co. now beat a hasty retreat to the staircase. Still under pursuit, they get to the top of the plateau and race for the aircraft. They manage to take off but the tank has been holed by gunfire and are almost dry. Chapter 9: New Perils Out of fuel, Biggles is forced to land on a river. In between the team braving the various perils of the jungle, Dusky discovers the dead and dying members of a canoe team which Carruthers has sent up with petrol for them. Fortunately, the canoe is sunk in the middle of the river and it might be possible to recover some of the cans. Chapter 10: Swift Developments But it has been raining upstream and the river is beginning to flood. They barely have time to retrieve a few cans and refuel the aircraft before it breaks free from its moorings and is carried downstream by the current. Biggles is the only one on board and manages to take off--he heads for the coast after dropping a message telling the others to stay put and wait. While Dusky goes off to look for food, Algy and Ginger are suddenly jumped by a group of Indians who capture and bring them to their village. There they meet Eddie Rockwell--he's one of the Americans who had gone missing while treasure hunting. He tells how his partners Silas Schmitt and Joe Warner had abandoned him after tricking him into financing the expedition. The descriptions of the two men match people Algy and Ginger remember seeing among the people with the Tiger. Soon, the village is attacked by Bogat and his men. Eddie, Algy and Ginger are taken prisoner and brought back to the Tiger's village. Chapter 11: The Snake Biggles returns from reporting to Carruthers and Dusky tells him what happened to Algy and Ginger. They set off to resuce them. Along the way, Biggles has to rescue Dusky who found himself mesmerised and walking towards a large snake. Approaching the Tiger's village, they learn that the prisoners had all been moved to new excavations, this time at the ruined city the top of the plateau. Disguising himself by dressing up in the clothes of one of the Tiger's slaves, Biggles makes his way up the staircase to the plateau accompanied by Dusky. Chapter 12: Ginger Gets Some Shocks Biggles joins the slaves working on the plateau and makes contact with Algy, Ginger and Eddie. Ginger tells them he has discovered a stone with markings made by E. Carmichael and Len Roberts, possibly indicating the location of the treasure. But Biggles is more concerned about planning their escape. With his pistol he disarms two guards. Algy and Ginger use their rifles to shoot down two more. Biggles leads the rush for the staircase down but the way is barred by Bogat arriving with a score of armed men coming up from the village. Out of options, Biggles and co. retreat to a stone house among the ruins. Chapter 13: Strange Events Biggles suggests a little exploring--the place where Ginger found Carmichael's markings might lead to a secret place where the treasure was hidden. It would make a better hideout than the stone house. Ginger finds a movable stone slab leading to steps going into an underground chamber. The party moves there but are disappointed to find it empty. Biggles goes out to scout around but seems a long time coming back. Then the others hear a mighty explosion and find the stone slab stuck, trapping them underground. Chapter 14: Biggles Makes a Capture The explosion is the Tiger's men blowing up the stone house with dynamite. Biggles makes his way down the staircase and meets up with Dusky who tells him he thought he saw the Tiger also going down. Biggles now descends to the village and breaks into the Tiger's office thinking he might capture the King but is disappointed to find only Bogat and Marcel Chorro. Nonetheless Biggles decides march his two prisoners to his aricraft. He would fly them out to Carruthers and hope to return with some reinforcements to deal with the rest of the gang. Along the way, they are ambushed by Indians who kill botb Bogat and Chorro with blowpipes. Biggles and Dusky are no safer and take cover. Chapter 15: Desperate Diversions Algy, Ginger and Eddie don't remain idle either. After Biggles departs, they hear the explosion and find their hatch blocked. But Eddie soon discovers a hidden exit covered by a movable stone idol on a pivot. They explore chamber after chamber, going through trapdoor after trapdoor and soon find the treasure that they had all been looking for. However the way back to the original chamber had been blocked Chapter 16: Carruthers Takes a Hand Meanwhile Biggles and Dusky wait until the Indians have gone off and then make it to the Wanderer. They fly to Belize and report to Carruthers. They then return to the Tiger's camp with Carruthers himself and as many policemen as could be packed into the Wanderer. First Biggles drops off four men, three police and Dusky, to cover the bottom of the staircase with a machine gun. The Wanderer then lands on the plateau to disembark the rest of the policemen. The Tiger's men move to attack but quickly withdraw when the police on the plateau deploy a second machine gun. Now the Tiger's enslaved labourers take a hand and rise up in revolt, attacking with their excavation tools. The Tiger's troops to panic and scatter. Biggles makes it to the underground chamber but finds Algy and the rest are no longer there. Chapter 17: Unexpected Meetings All this time, Algy, Ginger and Eddie are trying to find their way out of their series of underground chambers. They reach a cave and are making their way through it when they discover it is full of tarantulas! Hastening onwards, they reach the stairway at the entrance of the cave when they bump into the Tiger! Algy points his gun at the Tiger and orders him to get back but he ignores the warning and pushes past them and heads into the cave. He emerges a few moments later, having been bitten by taratulas, loses his balance on the stairway and falls and bumps his head, and becomes unconscious. Algy, Ginger and Eddie spot Carruthers and Biggles and tell them what happened. The Tiger is taken into custody and brought to Belize for trial. Dusky is rewarded with a position in the native police. Carruthers takes possesion of the treasure in the name of the Crown. Much of the treasure later finds its way into museums but Biggles, Algy, Ginger and Eddie receive handsome compensation for their efforts. Of course, Eddie wants Biggles and co. to join him, probably for another adventure but Biggles wisely refuses. Category:Plot summaries